


Coffee Stains and Bullet Wounds

by pepperdot



Category: Original Work
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Injury, M/M, Mac beats love away with a stick but he comes around eventually, Near Death, Tags will change as I update, Victor is capable of accepting and giving love normally thank god, dragging your workaholic boyfriend home at 4am, except they're all mac and victor, it's fine they're both fine i'm fine, it's four am and time to go to bed for everyone involved, jumping between a threat and your partner is normal right, mac has done several things wrong every single day of his life, otp prompts, they're in love and dealing with it slowly, victor has never done anything wrong in their entire life
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-16
Updated: 2020-12-16
Packaged: 2021-03-11 00:20:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,152
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28096062
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pepperdot/pseuds/pepperdot
Summary: Prompt fills of "different ways to say 'I love you'" (and some miscellaneous others) for Victor and Mac.Or, they're both trying to figure out—sometimes it takes more work than expected. And sometimes it's easier than breathing.Marked done, but will be adding chapters as I hit prompts!
Relationships: Victor Price/Mac Warren
Kudos: 2
Collections: Price Brothers, Victor Comes Home AU





	1. Come Home (Part I)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> First two prompts combined into one!
> 
> 'Who takes a bullet for their partner,' and 'who clutches the other person, whispering, 'don’t die.''
> 
> Or, Mac brings Victor home.

The world is hazy and Victor can’t tell if that’s the ceiling or the floor they’re looking at. It’s swimming, though, warping like it might cave in over him, and his hands are so cold. Something hot and slick is spilling over their fingers, and vaguely they think that might be a bad thing. 

“Don’t you dare,” someone is saying, and it’s sharp like knives and familiar in a way that twists them deeper. “Fucking— _open your eyes,_ Victor.” 

And Victor doesn’t know why he’s listening, has no idea when he closed his eyes or who’s demanding otherwise, but he forces them open anyway. 

“Keep them that way,” Mac is still telling him, and it’s _Mac,_ because of course it is. Victor wants to say something, make it light and laughing and worth pushing the wild light out of Mac’s eyes, but their tongue is so heavy. 

The ground against his spine is like ice—that _is_ the ceiling then, and there’s a mystery solved—and the air is like falling snow, and Mac’s fingers are fire where he’s drawing something out across Victor’s ribcage. Victor wonders vaguely what’s burning, what could possibly—then realizes the heat is theirs too, that of course Mac doesn’t have proper ink with him. His pens and back-up pens were lost in the chaos, gone long before the gun was leveled at him, that he’s using the spilling scarlet to trace heal-stop-not-yet-please-not-yet wards, over and over and over again into their skin. 

And Mac’s hands are stained, dyed black always whether they like it or not, but it’s been a long, long time since Victor was worried about them being stained like this. But here they are, Victor’s blood across Mac’s fingers, and it feels like a joke warped cruel. 

Victor wants to reach out, touch the hair clinging to Mac’s temples,  
his lips are moving because he wants to say something, maybe tell him it’ll be alright, maybe say _god I’m sorry, I’m sorry—_

They doesn’t realize they’re reaching out until Mac’s pushing the hand back down, fingers too-tight around their wrist.  
“Don’t move,” Mac snaps, and it’s so familiar that Victor wants to laugh. He can’t, though, because there’s something bubbling up in his lungs, and there’s a flicker of something raw and desperate across Mac’s face in response. It doesn’t fade, and that more than anything makes a twinge of concern in Victor’s gut churn.

“Damien’s going to kill you,” Mac says, and it sounds harsh on his tongue. “Damien’s going to _kill you,_ Victor, you can’t do this to him again.” There’s a splinter there, not quite a crack but sharp and afraid still. Victor watches Mac swallow, watches him re-trace the wards on their ribcage with too-steady fingers.

He wants to say something, but everything is so slow and the edges of his vision are buzzing with static. Still, it’s clear enough for Victor to see the panic grow and fester in Mac, can see when it clenches around his throat. And that gets them, that makes them nervous, _god_ Damien’s going to have to see them like this, Mac is already seeing this—

“Victor,” Mac is saying, urgent and sharp, may have been saying it for long minutes. His hand is sliding up, pressing to the pulse at Victor’s throat and staying there like he can force it to keep beating with desperate fingers. 

There’s a beat of silence, real silence, not the kind that is pulsing at the back of Victor’s skull. The room is heavy with it, but there’s shouting in the distance. It’s also familiar, in a hazy way, and Mac calls something back in response. His eyes never leave Victor, not for a moment, and Victor’s grateful but can’t think of why. 

“You’re coming home,” Mac promises, quiet and just for them, and he’s vicious in it, radiant and furious and cracked around it all, and Victor loves him, loves him like the blood spilling across both their fingers and the bullet buried in their ribs, and Mac is— 

“I’m bringing you home,” he’s saying, and the hand is curled against Victor’s jaw now, is pushing back hair and isn’t steady anymore. “You fucking idiot, I would’ve _survived_ that shot, I’m bringing you _home_.”

And Victor believes him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> First look at Mac's powers in canon and canon-adjacent worlds! He's a bastard but he loves Victor and it shows 
> 
> first prompt's an angst one, but there's plenty of soft content ahead :))
> 
> Victor's one of digitalScribbler's characters! Go check her works out, including a stunning comic with these two! We have a lot of content with Victor, Mac, and the rest of the ensemble, so make sure to glance through our collections if you want to learn more about them :))


	2. Come Home (Part II)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Second prompt! 
> 
> 'Behind someone who’s sitting down, leaning over to kiss the forehead (and potentially block their eyesight with hair falling in their face).'
> 
> Or, it's Victor's turn to bring Mac home. There's far less bleeding involved this time.

Mac is still sitting at his desk, because of course he is. 

Victor doesn’t even huff a half-laugh at it—only because they already did, out in the hall when they saw the light spilling under the door—and instead lets the door click shut behind them. Mac doesn’t look up, just jots something down and makes a vaguely noncommittal noise in Victor’s direction. There’s only two empty cup there tonight, and Victor is choosing to consider that a victory. 

And because Mac is hunched over his desk silently, no doubt for the thirteenth hour in a row, Victor doesn’t say anything either. They cross the room, loop around the desk and that’s something new too, when Mac doesn’t twitch even when they step up behind him. 

Victor’s not going to complain, though. He rests his palms on Mac’s shoulders instead, leaves them there as he leans over. Their hair is spilling everywhere, two-am-tangles, flooding into Mac’s eyes as they leave a hello-it’s-late-I-missed-you-you’re-an-idiot kiss against his forehead. And finally, finally, Mac exhales and his shoulders shift under Victor’s hands. 

“Your hair’s a mess,” Mac says very dryly. He sets down his pen and lifts a hand to push said mess out of his face.

“You like it.” Victor states, because it’s true, and he’s rewarded with a quiet snort of laughter. There’s something in the movement of Mac’s spine as he laughs, the way he tips his head back just a little to look up at Victor, and it makes trekking out here in the middle of the night warm instead of exhausting. 

“It has its uses,” Mac acknowledges, and slides his hand up higher to curl casually greedy fingers there. He’s twisting around, just a little, and Victor lets himself be guided back down. 

They press a third kiss to Mac’s temple after, when he’s already turning back to his work, and let it linger there. 

“C’mon,” he murmurs, “Time to go home.” He doesn’t add the threat, the silent willingly-or-otherwise, but he needs to less and less these days. Another tiny victory, to mark in next to the two coffee cups. 

Mac’s picked the pen back up, is rolling it between his fingers for a long moment. He’s not writing, though, and Victor rolls his eyes. They’re patient, know this battle in and out, and so they just squeeze Mac’s shoulder and let their hands slide down his shoulders. 

“Home,” they say again, and Mac puts the pen down. 

One more little victory, Victor thinks as he pulls Mac home— _home_ —to add in with the cups and quiet nights and warmth of tomorrow’s slow morning.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am greedy for soft content and im right


End file.
